“I’m Proud to be a Transgender Catholic” – TIME Magazine [Reblog]

I came to school as Jes, a compassionate, but at times confused, young female searching for a way through school. I left Fontbonne as Nick, a young Catholic man who was more confident going out into the world.

During my transition from female to male, I was often confused with and mad at God. I didn’t understand why I had been born in the wrong body. This anger and confusion with how God had made me seeped into my daily life. I often wasn’t present to my friends and their needs, and I lost a sense of who and what mattered to me.

During this struggle, I closed myself off to God. But God never tired of pursuing me, and eventually we rekindled our relationship. It was at this point that I relearned one of the basic truths of our faith: that God created me, that God loves me, and that God accompanies me. The Lord already knew that I wasn’t accepting a part of myself, but once I told God how broken I felt, he showed me how loved I was.

Hey! So I just skimmed the article you sent me, and I’ve read Walt’s story elsewhere (and I think he trolled my site very early on when Catholictrans first went “live”).

The issue with Walt is he probably wasn’t transsexual in the first place. Now I am VERY wary of invalidating other peoples’ experiences or saying “this person is a REAL transsexual while this other person isn’t,” but Walt’s story is so different than that of most transgirls I’ve talked to. For one, Walt was forced to dress as a girl and felt that he could only be loved as a girl. For me, it was the opposite. I was expected to dress as a guy and felt I could only be loved as a guy. Walt wanted to BECOME a woman. I feel that I AM a woman, whether I transition or not.

I’m suspicious of Walt because he panders very deliberately to the culture wars and builds a narrative that hits all the chords conservative folks will be looking for. For example, he really harps on how trauma “made” him transgender. I personally have not experienced sexual abuse or any major childhood trauma and had a pretty perfect Catholic upbringing, and I know many similar cases to mine, There is some correlation between being transgender and trauma, but I think in a lot of cases it’s because predators seek out vulnerable and sensitive kids, and trans kids tend to be both of those.

Transchristians.org has a page on Walt (http://www.transchristians.org/people/walt-heyer) where they claim he was eventually diagnosed with dissasociative identity disorder. I’d take their info with a grain of salt, but it’s clear that Walt Heyer is a controversial and troubled figure. From my own brief interactions with him, he seems something of a controversionalist.

It’s too bad Al Kresta is running that piece. I’m a family friend of the Krestas. Maybe after I’m out to them, I can get my own story on his show.

The thing about Walt’s story that most intrigued me was the idea that, after treating every other mental issue, he no longer felt the need to become a woman.

Mind you, I understand he went through a lot, and perhaps it was his abnormal case that caused such a pressure. But, from what you know, do TG people generally… do they concern themselves about anything in their mental health besides the dysphoria issue?

And I agree with you that it is quite possible for Walt to be the odd man out, and for there to be real TG people, given the nature of the soul and body of a person. I’m just trying to make sense of all this myself. What you’ve said makes some sense. What Melinda posts about makes sense, too. But oddly so does Walt – when he says perhaps other unrelated mental disorders may be causing the problem. It’s very perplexing to me who has no experience of it.

But, no, seriously. It would be very cool to hear the other side of the story broadcast on Catholic radio that many people listen to. It was very cool to hear Melinda Selmys on Catholic Answers. I hope you get your chance.

There are certainly trans* people out there who just want to alleviate their dysphoria and want to cut to the chase. For myself – and I can only really speak for myself – I was concerned more with personal integration and mental health more than I was with any particular outcome. Part of what convinced me that I’m transgender is I expected that the more I heal and integrate, the more my gender identity will subside. I was caught off guard by the fact that the more my heart healed and the less compartmentalized I became, the more I felt like a woman.